Pune: Close aide of Devendra Fadnavis meets Sharad Pawar

Pune: BJP leader and State Minister Harshvardhan Patil has started strategising for the upcoming State Assembly elections. He is an aspirant from the Indapur segment under the Baramati Lok Sabha seat. Since sitting Indapur MLA Dattatraya Bharne is from the NCP (AP), it is still not clear whether the seat would go to the BJP.

It was said that after Samarjitsinh Ghatge quit the BJP and joined the NCP (SP), Harshvardhan Patil would follow suit. On Tuesday (August 27), Patil met NCP (SP) President Sharad Pawar.

Patil met Pawar at the Vasantdada Patil Sugar Institute office. The meeting lasted for almost half-an-hour. This raised a question whether he would contest from the Indapur seat on the NCP ticket. Bharne was an NCP candidate but joined the Ajit Pawar camp after a split in the party. This leads to a discussion that the NCP (SP) may provide an alternative candidate from the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA).

A Governing Council meeting was scheduled to take place at the Vasantdada Patil Sugar Institute. Vijaysinh Mohite Patil, Vishwajeet Kadam and Harshvardhan Patil attended the meeting. Later, Patil and Pawar held another meeting. Patil has been in touch with the NCP (SP) for the past few weeks. It was said that he wanted to contest from the Indapur seat on the NCP ticket. However, details of his meeting with Pawar were not known immediately. Patil is a close aide of DyCM Devendra Fadnavis.

Meanwhile, Smarjitsinh Ghatge from Kagal has decided to join the NCP (SP). He will formally join the party on September 3 when Sharad Pawar will be on a tour of Kolhapur district. Hence, there is likely to be a direct fight between NCP (AP) leader Hasan Mushrif and Ghatge in Kagal. Moreover, if Harshvardhan joins the NCP (SP), the Maha Yuti will have to work very hard to retain the Indapur seat.